No One Left Behind
by Jay Rock Kay
Summary: Commander Shepard wasn't the only one who got to know his crew on his way to the Omega-4 Relay... One-Shots of characters not often teamed together.
1. 1 Miranda & Grunt in: Tank Bred

Miranda & Grunt in: "Tank Bred"

"TAKE THEM DOWN! DON'T LET THEM NEAR THE PACKAGE!"

As Miranda Lawson and Commander Shepard took cover after dismantling the initial volley of Eclipse mercenaries with a timed neck snap and exploding crates, the newly birthed Grunt, not wanting to be shown up, charged at the survivors with a roar. A salarian far away was only able to unholster his pistol before the young krogan shot him square in the chest with a high-energy concussive shot. The salarian shot right off his feet and slammed into the wall of crates with a crunch, audible all the way from the other wide of the arena, and collapsed on the floor.

"HA! RIGHT ON YOUR ASS!" Grunt punched the air, watching his attempt at making the scaly enemy fly, then turned his attention to the last man standing.

The sole survivor, a batarian with a surprisingly quick hand for someone shaking like a leaf, was able to pull out his assault rifle and unload half his thermal clip into Grunt, bouncing off his shields in explosions of blue light. With a scream that the two humans didn't know a batarian could make in such a high pitch, the half-ton krogan slammed into him, crushing the side of one of the crates apart, blood and microprocessors spilling into the air. Grunt lifted himself off from the pile of gore that used to be the batarian and walked over to the salarian. He crawled on his elbows, legs limp behind him, reaching for his pistol. The krogan opened up his shotgun, a Claymore almost as big as the salarian, and turned the head and shoulders of the salarian into pulp.

"Clear!"

From Miranda's estimate, the krogan turned the remaining mercenaries into grease stains in less than a minute. As she stepped out of cover and watched the krogan wipe his boot heel clean of bits of meat and ligament, she started to consider that maybe Shepard was right to send him with them after all.

In her defense, it seemed like there wouldn't have been reason too bring such firepower—all she expected was to watch as Niket escorted her sister and her foster family to the space port, to be transferred away from her father's reach. She argued with the Commander from her office to the shuttle bay, never breaking stride.

"Isn't the Executive Officer supposed to follow my orders?"

"In matters with the ship and overall mission, of course, but this is my _sister _I'm talking about. I am not going to jeopardize her safety with such a...heavy risk."

"Sure, Grunt's a bit..."

"Of a sociopath?"

"I was going to say 'difficult,' but perhaps. I don't know, I'll leave the disorders up to Yeoman Chambers." Shepard stepped into the elevator with her and pressed the button to the shuttle bay. He turned to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Look, he'll follow my orders, and I figured you'd want the biggest hard-hitter you can to keep your sister safe." His eyes looked down to see his hand still on her shoulder and moved it away. "You know, besides me." He grins in a way that would make her want to slap him, if she didn't feel like that already.

"Okay, what about Garrus?"

"A sniper would be helpful, but he's got his own personal stuff he's working through right now."

"Zaeed?"

"Do you really want him anywhere near your sister?"

"...Good point."

"Miranda, Grunt is the epitome of violence, but he has never once harmed anyone that wasn't in the way of accomplishing our mission." The two stepped out of the elevator and stopped to the side, away from Grunt, already prepped and waiting next to the shuttle. "I promise you we will do whatever it takes to protect your sister."

"Shepard..."

"Okay, you know what, I'll get someone else real quick." Shepard pressed a button on his visor. "Jack, gear up, there's been a change in—"

"Okay, fine! Let's take the krogan and get this over with." Miranda walked away with Shepard a step behind.

"Never mind, Jack. Just messing with Miranda. I'll talk to you later." Miranda rolled her eyes, vaguely hearing Jack's raspy yell through his communicator about needles and her "bubbly butt." "Oh, and Jack says 'Hi.'"

So Miranda watched Shepard continue to be proven right as they progressed through the cargo bay filled with Eclipse mercenaries. Grunt was a fantastic distraction—tearing through heavy troopers and vanguards like tissue paper as Shepard and Miranda picked off the strangling engineers with their guns, tech and biotic attacks.

Finally, they made it to an elevator, and as she tapped into the mercs' communication frequency, she saw Shepard turn his tech armor off and suddenly her stomach was in a knot. They haven't known each other for long, but she's learned that usually when he turns his armor off, it means he wants to _talk. _Without looking at him, she explained how she wasn't telling the whole truth about her "younger sister." A more explicit explanation of her father's...intentions.

"I was not the first he made—I was just the first one he kept."

Shepard was more understanding than she sould have given him credit for. She looked into his eyes and she wished she had trusted him the truth before. It was...unsettling. But what unsettled her the most was Grunt. Since they met her contact in Eternity, Grunt had no opinion on anything that didn't have to do with eviscerating anything and anyone that shot him. At that moment in the elevator, she could feel the krogan looking right through her.

The elevator door opened, and she moved out. No time to think about why the Commander could do that to her or why the krogan was dissecting her with his eyes. Oriana needed to be taken somewhere safe, and she was going to get it done, even if it killed her.

* * *

_**Weeks later, Tuchanka orbit:**_

Miranda Lawson found very quickly from their vid-chats together that Oriana was so much funnier than her. When her younger sister told her about her days at the Citadel, it wasn't curt and specifically detailed like a mission report to the Illusive Man, but warm and full of tangents about her life; her schoolwork, her friends, their boy troubles, her boy trouble singular that the younger Lawson thought she was being so coy about...

Her parents, who loved her unconditionally...

Miranda was finding that her face actually stung from the smiles that her sister pulled from her. Her sister, and the man who went out of her way to save her...

The buzzer to her office door sounded. She sighed.

"I think duty calls. I'll talk to you later, Ori." She signed off the vid-chat and pressed a button on her console, unlocking the door. "Shepard, what can I—"

Grunt stepped through into her office, almost not fitting all the way. It struck her odd that the krogan would walk into her office of his own free will. But as she thought through her time on the ship, the only person who actually visited her regularly was...Shepard.

"Grunt," she replied, pulling herself back together. "I thought you were planetside."

"I was."

"...Is there something I can do for you?"

"Yeah. Shepard figured out what was wrong. Turns out it was nothing. Just need to do this 'Rite of Passage' thing, get into one of the krogan clans, something like that."

"And this being a krogan initiation, I assume that's going to involve a lot of shooting at the deadly wildlife?"

"Hah! Got it in one, Lawson." She wasn't sure if she liked his new short name for her, but she learned long ago to pick her battles. "Rules say that my Battlemaster and another warrior of the same clan can fight by my side."

Miranda nodded and shifted back in her seat. "I understand. Do you need help looking for one of the crew? I'll ping them and—"

"I chose you."

Miranda studied the krogan's face as he leaned over to face her. She observed his comings and goings on the ship with her security feeds, as he became accumulated with the rest of the crew. If there was one thing she could say about the krogan, it was that he had no poker face. He had no ulterior motives, just the need to fight and to win. As an operative, it limits his usefulness to be nothing more than a convenient meat shield, but it also made him brutally honest. She looked in his eyes, and she knew he wasn't lying.

"Why? Surely someone else would be more useful. My skillsets are more useful with humans and mechs. If you want someone to take down a pack of rampaging varren, I'd recommend Zaeed—"

"Shepard has similar training."

"Yes, but he's trained himself to be a walking tank. Alliance would have likely made him a vanguard if he wasn't just as good at ripping people apart with an incineration blast. I'm more trained in long-range and espionage combat. I..." Hand stiff, she placed her hand on his own. "I appreciate the thought, but I am not the best qualified for this...and you know that, don't you?"

The krogan stood back up and started walking away. Miranda stood up from her chair to catch his forearm with her hands.

"Tell me the truth, Grunt. Why did you want me?"

The krogan shifted his arm and tore her grip from him. He looked away for a moment, seemingly collecting his thoughts, and turned to look at her, towering over her,eyes inspecting her like he did on the elevator on Illium.

"You are a different species, but you are tank-bred, like me. I am going back to that worthless, radioactive rock to prove what I am. A warrior, worthy of a clan despite the means of my birth." His eyes...didn't so much soften, so much as shifted, like a knife turned away from it's deadly end. "Figured you wanted the same."

As Grunt turned to walk away, Miranda focused hard to bring her breath back, eager for the door to close so as to avoid what had just happened. But as her breath returned, she sprinted out of her office.

"Wait!" Grunt stopped and turned. "Let me get my gear ready." Miranda nearly blanched as she saw him grin.

"Heh heh heh. Don't take too long, Lawson. Glory awaits us!"

* * *

"Son of a...is that a bleeding _thresher maw?_"

"NOT YET IT ISN'T! HAH HAH HAH HAH!"

If she was asked how she was feeling at the moment, Miranda Lawson would have to say that she was feeling a little less put together than usual. She had to deal with wave after wave of varren and some strange bug things that looked like what would happen if the Keepers and the rachni had freaky bugsex. If she had not reconfigured her overload field to deliver neural shocks to organics, she would have been overrun a few times. Shepard seemed to not have many problems, from what she could tell.

Grunt, on the other hand, was having a ball. She had never seen a being that was so happy to have the entrails of it's kills drenched all over him.

"I WILL RIP IT'S HEART FROM IT'S CHEST! FOR TUCHANKA!"

Exchanging his shotgun for a Vindicator assault rifle, he shot at the thresher maw, shots pinging off it's scales and eyes like pebbles.

"Like the confidence, Grunt, but I don't think that's going to work," Shepard said as he pulled the M920 Cain from his back. "This might. Grunt, I want you and Miranda to keep it distracted while I get this bad girl primed." Shepard ran to cover behind one of the broken pillars, taking one last look at the krogan who he's fighting for, and the woman who was the last person he thought would be in this pit. He started warming the megaton device, as fast as he could.

Grunt heeded the words of his Battlemaster and started running towards the stories tall monstrosity, blasting away at it with his assault rifle. Miranda ran behind him, despite the fight-or-flight instinct telling her to run the hell away, shooting warp fields and rounds from her heavy pistol at the beast before ducking into the nearest cover.

Grunt, on the other hand, kept moving closer, aiming for the weak spots that were imprinted into his brain by the Old Man. The soft, exposed bits of flesh hidden underneath heavy scales, the tusk like teeth exposed outside of the creature, and, of course, the eyes and the inside of it's acid-spewing mouth.

With a roar that made the ground tremble, the thresher maw disappeared back into it's hole. The air was still, silent except for Shepard's curses at the experimental weapon and Grunt's pacing.

"COME OUT YOU COWARD!"

"Grunt, the thing has a brain the size of a pea," Miranda replied as she popped the heat sink of her Phallax, "you can't appeal to it's honor."

"I'm not. I'm trying to RIP THAT PEA-SIZED BRAIN FROM IT'S SKULL."

"And we will, Grunt, just try not to get in the way of Shepard's nuclear warhead gun."

"Think that little thing'd kill me, Lawson?"

"I'd rather not find out—"

As Miranda smiled at the krogan, the ground rumbled once again and she was cast in shade. She didn't need to look up to see the thresher maw was by her side, but she did anyway, out of sheer dumb human habit. After taking a second to gape at the creature that she didn't have, she ran from her cover and made a bee-line for another column she could hide behind. She could hear from behind her a lighter, almost fizzier rubble from inside the thresher maw.

She knew what was going to happen—she had seen the files from when a Cerberus cell experimented on the creatures on Akuze—it was going to launch it's acid like spit at her. It will burn straight through her barriers and shields, burn straight through skin and muscle and bone. It will be like she never existed, quick and painless—and that was if she was lucky. If even her barrier stayed up, it would just burn through her slowly...

Miranda decided that if she was going to die, her last thought would be of Oriana. She had made a lot of mistakes, did a lot of things she wasn't proud of, but at least she did one thing right. Her sister would have the normal, happy life she never had.

But then she heard the other human scream her name, and her thoughts went to Shepard. The big, charismatic man who she spent the past two years bringing back to life. The orphan with a chip on his shoulder who became a hero to the galaxy despite being more than a bit of a smartass, who helped make that life for her sister possible, for no other reason than she asked. She thought of his big grin, his quick wit, the way he fought and...

The last thought as the acid was about to rain on Miranda Lawson was _Oh bollocks I'm in love with the bastard._

And then she felt something large and heavy push her down and enveloped her as the acid spilled onto the ground. Miranda opened her eyes to see Grunt above her. She got her bearings again and saw the acid coating and burning through the krogan's armor.

"Had a good nap, Lawson?"

Miranda was about to reply with an equally smartass remark when she heard the gurgling from above them all. The maw was about to spit again, and the krogan stayed put above her. She didn't know if he could take another volley like that without his shields or armor in place, but she didn't intend to find out. Miranda glowed as she opened up her biotics.

"Grunt, fire everything you got at the right eye of the bastard."

The krogan nodded, turned towards the beast, and fired his rifle at full volley. She could see his aim was true, the rounds bouncing off it's eye, but if she was right, she could also see where the eye was starting to rip from the slugs. In her hands she formed a warp field, and then pushed herself further, intent on making it as big as she could. Sweat would have poured down her, if the crackling energy didn't evaporate it before it could start to form. Finally, the field was as wide as her shoulders, burning her hands as she held it.

"Duck!"

Grunt did as ordered and dived down as Miranda threw the field, praying to every god she ever heard of that she aimed it right. The ball of warp field energy flew through the air, arcing to the right and diving right towards the eye of the beast. The field crackled across the eye, tearing through the jelly of the eye and exploding in a sea of gore.

"Perfect," Miranda said.

The ground shook once more as the thresher maw screamed and thrashed. Miranda looked over to Shepard as he was aiming the Cain at it.

"Get to cover!"

Grunt and Miranda ran towards a collapsed pillar and dived to it's side. Miranda watched as the high velocity slug shot from the cannon, and the next second Shepard is pushed back and obscured by a gust of wind and dust. When the dust clears, Miranda peered over her cover to see the thresher maw, slumped to it's side with half of it's namesake atomized.

"Miranda!"

The operative turned to see Shepard jogging towards her, eyes wide and frowning.

"I'm fine, Shepard, nothing that an hour-and-a-half long shower won't fix. Grunt took most of the damage." They turned to see Grunt was jumping and pumping his fists, yelling at the dead thresher maw.

"YEAH! WE KILLED IT! WE KILLED THE FUCKER! HA HA HA HA! WE ARE KROGAN!"

"I'm gong to go ahead and assume he's fine," Shepard said, offering his hand to her. Miranda was about to wave it off to get up herself, but then she looked right at him, his hazel eyes and his stupid little smile. She took his hand and let him pick her up to her feet, feeling the warmth from the touch, much to her chagrin.

"Alright Grunt, let's get back to the Urdnot compound," Shepard said as he reclamped the Cain to his back. He started to walk back, and Miranda tapped the newly-minted krogan and got him to walk next to her, a few steps behind the commander.

As they neared their vehicle, Grunt walked closer to Miranda and for the first time from her perspective, talked softly.

"So, feel more like a warrior now, Lawson?"

"I'm a fighter, Grunt, there is a difference." She paused, thinking about the past hour. "I know I'm more versatile, though, so there's that." She put a hand on the krogan's arm. "And...thank you, for saving my life."

"You are krannt. Besides, we tank-breds have to stick together, right?"

Next: Samara & Thane in: "Cops & Robbers"


	2. 2 Samara & Thane in: Parental Guidance

Thane Krios believed in the inter-connectivity of the universe around him: how the actions in one place and time can affect another, no matter how seemingly random or far apart. Time flowed together like ripples in a pond. Case in point: a week ago he, with the help of Commander Shepard, saved his son. Kolyat Krios had every intention to waste his life by following in his father's footsteps, and they stopped him from sloppily assassinating a Citadel politician. After they took the young drell into C-Sec custody, Thane started the long process of reconciling with his son. Thus, as he, Shepard, and the asari Justicar Samara were scoping out a Blue Suns base, the assassin did something for the first time in years.

He missed his shot.

This mission was supposed to be relatively simple. They were on a small moon in the Terminus systems, so small that it never even gained an official name. On the moon was a small, prefab trailer, retrofitted with extra rooms. Intel said that the Blue Suns were using this small base as a pick up for red sand smuggling. There were about five in the trailer, and two patrollers. The plan was to quietly take out the patrol and then ambush the others right at their door. It would be a "crap shoot," as Shepard described it. Thane and Samara had no idea what that meant, but they assumed it was something easy for humans. Thane offered to go down to take the two out.

"Negative," Shepard said. "Not a lot of cover there, we shouldn't risk being seen. You brought the rifle with the silencer mod?"

Thane didn't verbally answer, he simply took the sniper rifle off his back and unfolded it into firing position. His M-97 Viper was refitted in the Normandy's armory with the reluctant help of Jacob Taylor. Whether the Cerberus officer was uncomfortable with being in that close of quarters with a drell, an assassin, or someone interfering with his job, he didn't know or care.

The assassin looked and saw a rocky hill that would give him a good vantage point. He crept to the location, laying low and bending and sliding towards his nest. He supposed he could have gotten an infiltrator cloak for this, but he never really felt a need for one. When he reached his nest, he laid down on the rocky ground and placed the Viper in position. His body moved on it's own, his experience kicking in, allowing his mind, his soul, to wander on it's own.

_Kolyat sits inside the interrogation room, blending into the bright blue room. I sit opposite of him, watch him twist and tangle his chains. A constant reminder. I wonder if it is intentional on his part._

_I speak his name, but his soul is not present. Perhaps he is far away in the past, happier times together. Perhaps he simply doesn't want to speak. I call for him again. He blinks, his eyes, sunset-colored like his mother's, sees me again. He frowns, his eyes set against me, again like his mother, on the day we met._

"_Came to grade my performance, father?" He spits his words like venom, and tugs at the shackles._

_It is intentional._

Thane fired at the wrong time. The slug meant for the man grazed the back of his helmet, cracking it as he turned at just the right second. It continued past him and slammed into the ground a meter away. The assassin had the man square in his sights, but he missed his moment. Thane cursed, no time to reload a fresh heat sink. He only had one more shot to salvage the op.

The mercenary, while likely not the smartest individual to ever cross the cosmos, was able to feel the crack of his helmet, see the dirt and rocks lift in the air to his left, and turned to his right to see what would make for a good sniper's nest. He held up his assault rifle towards the nest and yelled.

"ENEMIE—"

His last words were interrupted as another slug fired, and cracked his helmet completely, along with the rest of his skull. He would pray to Kalihira for the man's departure to the spirit world later. He still had a job to do.

Thane slammed a new heat sink into the rifle and set his sights on the next patrolman. Shepard and Samara, quick on their feet, were already adapting to the upcoming change to the combat arena. Samara glowed blue with biotic energy as she launched a reave at him. Tendrils of dark energy plunged through him, finding the open hole for his mouth, getting inside his flesh. The merc started to burn in biotic energy. If Thane had the capacity to shudder, he would. He had killed many, many people, often in gruesome ways, even with his biotics. The Reave, though, seemed like the worst way to die. Everything else affected the body, but as the Justicar sucked out the man's life-force, it seemed to him like she was ravishing on his soul.

Between the first guard's half-uttered warning and the other's cry of pain, Thane could see that the other mercenaries were becoming concerned. The five mercenaries dashed out, and as the fifth one crossed the opening, Thane took a shot at him. He knew he was back in the present, but he went for a torso shot, just in case. The shot destroyed his shields, and the second pierced through his armor and tore through his heart. The man crumbled to the floor, quickly bleeding out. A quick, merciful death.

Four.

Shepard and Samara rushed into the open valley and immediately used their biotics. Shepard threw a warp field at the nearest mercenary, who staggered and screamed as the dark energy tore through his body. Samara wrapped the furthest mercenary with dark energy and pulled him into the warped mercenary. The energies crackled at the touch and detonated. There was an explosion of dark blue light that eviscerated them.

Three. Two.

Said two scattered, trying to find cover in the trailer, blindly blasting at the two with their pistols. Shepard took his rifle and shot the two down. The two walked towards the slumped mercs. Shepard took one and checked his vitals. Deceased.

One.

Samara saw the man breathing shallowly, and took out her pistol. "Find peace in the embrace of your gods."

Zero.

Shepard called out an all-clear, and Thane collapsed his rifle and walked over to them.

"Well, that wasn't exactly like we planned, but the base is ours and didn't even make a dent to our shields. So yeah, go team." Shepard said as Thane was within earshot. Shepard walked over to meet him. "You okay there, Thane? I don't think I've ever seen you miss a shot before."

"I'm fine, just..."

"What is it?" Shepard asked. "Is it about...the thing...?"

"_I wanted to say I'm sorry," I reply, head bowing in shame._

"_For what? Being a crazy assassin killing all over the galaxy? For never being there when I was growing up? For letting mom die? For _leaving me _after she died?" Kolyat glares at me, and I force myself to look into my son's eyes. I let him look into my soul, and I pray he does not find it wanting._

"_For failing you."_

_We look each other in the eyes for long seconds. He breaks the contact and laughs, low and bitter._

"_So what, you think you can just...apologize and make everything better?" He turns back to me, but fails to meet my eyes, which I take as a small comfort. "Bring mom back, and then leave me alone. Find some hole in the ground and just _die _already."_

The memory lasted only a second in his mind, and Thane blinked it out of his waking mind and turned back to Shepard. "The thing?"

"Your illness."

"No, not at all. Just...haven't had to use a sniper rifle in a while." Shepard regarded Thane, looking him in the eyes as he spoke, then turned away. Thane could not tell if Shepard believed him or not, but he couldn't help but feel the Justicar peering straight through him.

"Alright then. Let's get the charges and blow this thing up. When the smugglers get here, I want to see them looking at a complete crater."

Samara sat in the middle of her quarters, long legs crossed, back perfectly straight. Her hands were wrapped around a perfectly formed corona of dark energy, emissions quietly surging through her body. The Justicar was a statuesque vision of asari peace and tranquility. She knew because she saw such statues back on Thessia almost a millennia ago. As a maiden, she linked the statue with stiffness, unfeeling, the epitome of asari pretentiousness. But when she joined the Justicars a lifetime ago, it was that statue that entered her mind, that she emulated as she learned to meditate.

But Samara did not think any of this, at least consciously. Her eyes were closed, but her mind was filled with the majestic view of space in front of her, both empty and desolate and thriving with energy and life. She was still, with only her deep, purposeful breaths the only sign she was not a statue herself. She was utterly serene, or as serene as she could possibly be.

Then she heard the door open. At first she thought it was Shepard, as he was one of the few people who come to visit her. It didn't surprise her—after all, she was a fighter of injustice in a ship filled with mercenaries, criminals, and terrorists. Then she realized the footsteps were different: the Commander had a step of a natural leader, strong, but never an overly aggressive stomp. This was the step of a being that had spent a lifetime never wanting to be heard, who might have succeeded if she had not spent several of of his lifetimes learning to hear such steps.

"Good evening, Thane Krios." His step faltered, but only for the briefest of seconds.

"Good evening, Justicar Samara." She opened her eyes, but was otherwise perfectly still.

"Please, just Samara will suffice," she replied as he walked in front of her. Her eyes met his as he observed her. "Most people who call me 'justicar' are either asari," she allowed a small bit of humor in her eyes, "or criminals begging for me to let them live."

"Thankfully, I am neither," Thane replied. "And no one calls me by their full name unless they're putting me on a contract, or they realize I am there to kill them."

"Very well, Thane, but I assume you did not come to banter. What can I do for you?"

The drell placed his hands behind his back and straightened his back, mouth terse over his words. "Well...I was...hoping to meditate with you."

Samara eyes widened, her face stretching in a way she had not felt in centuries. "I...of course, but, may I ask why?"

Thane turned his back from Samara as he took his jacket off. The fact that his face was hidden from the stoic asari was merely a bonus. It was a moment before he could speak. "I have had problems concentrating as of late."

"Such as on the planet a few days ago."

"Yes." Thane turned around, but could not quite meet the asari in the eye. "I will...fade out of the present and go to my past. It is something that my people are taught to control when we are children. To have it happen now is..."

"Embarrassing?"

"Yes. I figured if anyone could give me a...refresher course, it would be someone who has been meditating longer than my fathers have lived." A wry smile stretched across the asari's face, tight and unusual.

"Only as old as your fathers? I am touched." She watched as he nimbly sat down next to her, legs crossed. "However, I'm sure you know that there is not much one can teach in terms of meditation. You can either clear your mind of thoughts, or you cannot. Perhaps talking to someone about what ails you will help you re-achieve that inner peace." Thane looked away, staring into the stars, and Samara followed suit, waiting until he was ready to speak.

"My son. I'm sure you are aware of what happened on the Citadel."

"Secrets are too hard to hide on this ship."

Thane was quiet for a few moments as he collected his thoughts. "I wasn't much of a father to him. As he grew, I felt I needed to complete contracts to provide for him and his mother. When she died...I abandoned him. My desire for revenge was stronger than the need to be present for my son.

"To see him now...the open anger, his desire to hurt me at the cost of his future, if not his life...did I honestly believe that telling him about my disease would make all of that go away? Am I being foolish to believe I can reconcile with him?" Thane looked down, away from the stars. Samara looked back to him.

"I cannot say if you are being foolish. When I wasn't driven by rage, I was driven by regret. If you are a fool, then so am I." The justicar reached out and touched the assassin's hand. "I will say this: you cannot do anything about what happened in the past. But you can affect the present, and the future is not set in stone. It will be tough to mend the festering, old wounds, maybe even impossible, but it would be foolish not to." She looked down as her hand slipped away. "Not many people have the chance..."

Samara saw from the corner of her eye as his hand reached to her shoulder and squeezing. "Forgive my selfishness. I didn't think about..."

"My murdering my deviant daughter? It is what it is. The wound will ache regardless of who acknowledges it."

"Do you ever...think of her?"

"Of course. She was the reason I joined—"

"Not the Ardat-Yakshi you hunted. Your daughter. Do you ever remember her before..."

"It all went wrong? ...I remember she wanted to be an artist. She started when she was an infant, as soon as she could grab a hold of a paintbrush. She would draw with everything she could—the problem was that she would draw on _anything._" She felt a chuckle sweep through her body, foreign, unused since around the time of the memory. "One time, when she was...four or five—I don't know how, but she got her hands on her father's collectors edition biotiball. It was signed by all the members of the Thessian Fireballs. I was preparing dinner, and when I finished, I found her, paint somehow all over her face, biotiball in hand, painted over in bright pink." Thane chuckled, imagining the tiny little asari infant. "When I found her, she was starting to put glitter on her 'masterpiece.'" Thane laughed, surprising himself as much as the asari.

"And what did the father think of all this?"

"Oh, she was furious—but she could barely bring herself to be mad at her. Our little girl was just so _proud_ of her work!"

The two laughed, the mental image just being too much for their stoic natures. The laughter was another new situation for the justicar, but it quickly soured, and a tear steamed down her face. Thane saw it, arm moving, and the asari wiped it away on her own.

"I'm sorry, Samara. I didn't mean to bring up bad memories..."

"The memory itself is not bad—far from it. What came after...her desire to create mutated into draws for her victims..." Samara looked back to the stars. "My people, the Justicar Order, have old beliefs about the Ardat-Yakshi. Before we understood the genetic factors, we believed them to be asari possessed by a _daemon, _an evil spirit. When we killed an Ardat-Yakshi, we believed the soul was freed from the taint, and that their energy could live again. So in a sense, I didn't just gain justice for Morinith's victims...I saved my little girl as well."

"Do you believe that?"

"...I believe it's a comforting thought." She sat back in her meditative position. "But let us put the past behind us. Do you feel able to meditate now?" Thane smiled at the asari.

"I believe so." He got back into position alongside her. "And thank you, Samara, for listening and...understanding."

"The feeling is mutual, Thane." The justicar and the assassin sat together and emptied their minds, leaving only the stars in front of them, and each other.

_Next - Zaeed & Tali in: "Stranger Danger"_


End file.
